Efficient implementation of the keyed-hash message authentication code (HMAC) using the SHA-1 hash function

Abstract

In this paper, an efficient implementation, in terms of performance, of the keyed-hash message authentication code (HMAC) using the SHA-1 hash function is presented. This mechanism is used for message authentication in combination with a shared secret key. The proposed hardware implementation can be synthesized easily for a variety of FPGA and ASIC technologies. Simulation results, using commercial tools, verified the efficiency of the HMAC implementation in terms of performance and throughput. Special care has been taken so that the proposed implementation does not introduce extra design complexity; while in-parallel functionality was kept to the required levels.